One Piece belongs to Eiichiro Oda
Kingdom Hearts characters belong to Square Enix and Disney
OCs belong to me.
-Chapter Sixty-Nine-
"Uh-oh, this is bad, you guys! We're surrounded by Marines—aren't we?!" Usopp frantically cried once he realized that there were multiple Marine ships surrounding us on all sides. Each ship clearly far bigger than our own to the point that they felt comically massive...or more like our ship felt comically smaller than it really was.
"Awesome!" Luffy laughed.
"Exactly how is that awesome?" I sweat dropped.
"Think about it though, the Marines are having just as much of a hard time with this fog as we are" Nami suddenly remarked, reminding us of the thick fog that had settled around us and now currently provided us cover just the same as it hindered our vision.
"Exactly, it's probably best for us to escape under the cover of the fog" Robin agreed.
"Yeah, you're right—we'll just keep heading forward" Nami nodded. "Everyone, keep quiet—especially you Luffy" she instructed, quick to zero in on the captain who widely smiled back at her.
"Right" he nodded, acting as if he understood what she had said.
"Hey, Nami, is that a kid standing up there?" Sanji suddenly asked.
"A kid?" I echoed, gaze flicking in the direction the blond was pointing as I squinted my eyes in an attempt to see through the density of the fog.
"A little kid? What is he doing up there?" Nami frowned upon spotting the young redhead aboard one of the nearby Marine ships. He was dressed in a standard uniform you'd expect any of the cooking staff to wear aboard such a massive vessel and was currently dumping the contents of a cooking pot out into the sea.
"Well, it's not that uncommon for children—especially young boys—to be found on Marine ships" I said in response to Nami's question. "Some start out pretty early in their training no matter what it is they plan on doing abroad the ship—from the looks of it, I'd say that he's probably an apprentice of some sorts" I explained, watching as the boy lifted his head and jolt the second he spotted us not that far away. Clearly taken aback at the sight of us, he ended up accidentally knocking the cooking pot he had been holding overboard. Sloppily trying to grab the pot and stop it from falling...
He instead succeeded in flinging himself right over the railing along with it.
"Hold on" Sanji jolted, already getting ready to dive overboard and jump in after the kid.
"Please, allow me" Robin softly spoke, halting the blond in his movements as she used her Devil Fruit powers to instead catch the child and safely bring him aboard our ship. Moving him into the kitchen, we allowed ourselves to fall behind the Marines as Chopper watched over and tended to the child while we patiently sat around and waited for him to wake up.
"He's coming around, the smelling salt seems to be working" Chopper brightened once he noticed the boy was starting to stir.
"Where am I?" he jolted the moment he awoke, eyes now frantically flickering about in search of something familiar.
"Well, kid, you've ended up on board the ship of the Straw Hat Pirates" Usopp truthfully answered.
"You sure we should have told him that right away?" I asked, raising an eyebrow at the sharpshooter's decision to be straightforward. On one hand, it was good to not beat around the bush and strength the boy's panic...but, on the other hand, such a revelation that he was now aboard a pirate ship would only make him start to panic more. It's one thing to know that you'd encounter pirates while out at sea with the Marines and another to wake and find yourself aboard of pirate ship.
"I mean he would have figured it out sooner or later" Usopp shrugged.
"I guess..." I muttered, not really arguing with him.
"You're pirates...?" the boy cautiously questioned.
"Sure are" Luffy nodded.
"Don't you remember?" Nami asked. "A little while ago, you fell overboard on a Marine ship" she reminded him as he stared up at us with doe-like eyes that struggled for a moment to fully remember what had happened before he had fallen unconscious.
"Y-you stay back! You were planning an attack against the Marines—weren't you?!" he shouted, pointing an accusatory finger as he frantically backed up in an attempt to put distance between himself and us.
"Pretty ungrateful, considering we rescued him..." Usopp irritably grumbled.
"You can't blame him, he's a Marine after all" Robin reminded the sharpshooter.
"He's also still a kid, it's only natural for him to assume that we're up to no good" I shrugged, not the least bit bothered by the child's quick assumption that we were up to no good. It was only right—the Marines are righteous and pirates are evil, all children knew that no matter their upbringing.
"Here, eat something" Sanji said, setting down the bowl of soup that he had prepared earlier.
"Keep it, I don't need help from pirates" the boy glared, turning his nose up at the food being offered to him.
"It's rude to refuse food given to you" I softly frowned despite understanding where the child was coming from. He had every right to be suspicious of a meal prepared by pirates when he himself is a Marine. Not everyone would have shown him the same kind of mercy we were had someone else witnessed him falling from the ship.
"You have no interest in eating something prepared by a chef on a pirate ship, huh?" Sanji questioned, quick to pick up on what the child was doing. "You know, it's not like I poisoned it or anything—give it a try, you'll settle down once you have a little something in your stomach" he suggested just as the redhead's stomach loudly started to growl. Embarrassed, the boy hesitated for a moment before he finally gave in and started to down the soup as if his life depended on it.
"Thanks! That was great!" he cheerfully smiled once he was finished, bringing a gentle smile to my lips.
"No problem, you're welcome" Sanji smiled.
"My name is Tajio, I'm a probationary cook for the Marines" Tajio introduced, far more relaxed compared to earlier.
"I'm Sanji, the chef" Sanji greeted.
"What do you think? Pretty good, right?" Luffy grinned.
"Sanji, you're great! You're too good to be working on a rundown pirate ship like this—you could do better" Tajio praised while at the same time insulting the rest of us.
"What did you say? This ship isn't rundown!" Luffy defended.
"Yeah, that's right!" Usopp backed up. "This ship is from Syrup Village! Where I used to live!" he huffed.
"Was it a sweet village?" Chopper asked, causing me to laugh at how innocent of a question it was.
"No, what are you talking about?" Usopp frowned before going straight into telling the story of how he and the others came to obtain the Going Merry as Chopper continued innocently questioning him.
"Hey, hey, hey, calm down—will ya?" Nami softly huffed as she tried to settle down the riled-up sharpshooter.
-Later-
"So...um...earlier..." Tajio hesitantly spoke up once things started to calm down. Nervously twiddling his fingers, he cautiously went on to explain what had led to him accidentally falling off the Marine ship once he had our attention. "I spilled curry that was supposed to be for lunch and was supposed to remake it..." he sheepishly confessed as if embarrassed by his simple mistake.
"The chef was entirely right without question" Sanji said.
"Yeah, I agree" Luffy nodded.
"After that, I worked really hard—I tried to make it again and again, but...it never turned out right" Tajio dejectedly explained.
"Tajio, do you have any experience in cooking?" Nami curiously asked.
"Yeah, because based on the way you're speaking, it almost sounds like you've never cooked a thing in your life" I raised an eyebrow.
"It has been only six months now since I started as a probationary cook..." Tajio quietly admitted, almost sounding defensive.
"Well, that's long enough to learn something" Sanji said.
"No, it isn't! All I've gotten to do on the ship is wash dishes and peel some things—I hadn't even made any food yet!" Tajio frowned. "What's worse, this isn't any normal lunch that the curry was cooked for—all of the captains of the ships have a tradition," he shakily breathed, "they get together once a week and have curry for lunch, and this week my ship was supposed to host" he explained, sounding like he was on the verge of tears now the longer he thought about his mistake. "They're used to great curry, how is my dish supposed to measure up to what they're expecting?"
"The curry of the Marines is certainly famous, I hear chefs from each of the ships are always competing against each other to see which one can prepare the tastiest dish" Robin said.
"Oh! Sounds delicious!" Luffy grinned.
"It seems like the kid fucked up royally, I can see why he's so stressed out about this" I hummed.
"With six months in the galley, you should have more confidence than that" Sanji frowned. "But if you don't think you can do it, then just go back to your chef and apologize again" he suggested, already turning away from the kid.
"No way, I can't tell him that!" Tajio cried, grabbing his head in distress. "If I do then he'll put me off the ship!"
"Do you have to cook on a ship instead of land?" Luffy asked.
"And why that particular ship?" Nami questioned.
"She's right, there are plenty of other ships out there you could probably get an apprenticeship on, so what's this one so different?" I asked.
"Um...well...uh...have any of you heard of the All Blue...?" Tajio shyly asked, causing Sanji to halt in his tracks. "There's the East Blue, the West Blue, the South Blue, and the North Blue" he recited, listing off the names of the four major seas. "The All Blue is where you can find every delicacy from the four seas in one place—for a cook, it's a sea of treasure and I'd like to see it one day" he confessed. "The older cooks all laugh it off as a dream or a myth or something, but I still believe in it—the All Blue is out there somewhere. Marine warships go everywhere, so I have a good chance of finding it while being on one.
"That's why I can't afford to be put off the ship" he explained.
"Huh, that sounds familiar" Usopp smiled as we looked over to Sanji who was silently listening.
"I would really like us to get out of here as soon as possible" Nami suddenly admitted with a sigh.
"Yeah, if we're spotted, they'll most likely fire at us and that would not be a good situation" Usopp nodded in agreement.
"We're already running on thin ice with how long we've been hanging around, might as well get going before things take a turn for the worse" I said.
"However, we have to do something about Tajio" Nami pointed out. "We should get him back to his ship—right, Sanji?" she smiled.
"Fine, I'll take the kid back to his ship!" Sanji huffed as if he found the idea nothing more than a chore despite the rest of us knowing better. "Hey, Luffy! Give us a hand, will you?" he asked as the rubber man eagerly nodded.
"Gum Gum Luring Line!" Luffy stretched his arm further up ahead, grabbing hold of the Marine ship that the boy had fallen off of earlier. "Alright, Sanji, I got the other ship" he informed the blond, making it clear that he was ready to go whenever Sanji and Tajio were.
"This fog will probably clear up when afternoon comes" Nami estimated. "We really can't risk hanging around any longer than that, alright" she told the cook, making it clear to him that he was running on a time limit that neither he nor us could afford to go over.
"Yeah, that's enough" Sanji nodded as he and Tajio grabbed onto Luffy.
"Better be careful in getting them over there, captain—don't want to overshoot it" I said.
"Don't worry, I won't" Luffy widely smiled, happily laughing as I smiled right back.
"I'm sure you won't, just thought I'd remind you is all" I grinned, patting his shoulder.
"How much are you planning to help him?" Nami asked as she leaned in close to Sanji.
"I don't know what you mean, I'm only going to have a look at the galley and Marine ship..." the blond muttered, feigning ignorance as he directed his gaze elsewhere as if he was too embarrassed to admit the real reason why he was going onto the Marine ship with the kid.
A/N: Enjoy
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